Making the House Ready for the Lord

Dear Lord, I have swept and I have washed but still nothing is as shining as it should befor you. Under the sink, for example, is an uproar of miceit is the season of theirmany children. What shall I do? And under the eaves and through the walls the squirrelshave gnawed their ragged entrancesbut it is the season when they need shelter, so what shall I do? Andthe raccoon limps into the kitchen and opens the cupboard while the dog snores, the cat hugs the pillow;what shall I do? Beautiful is the new snow falling in the yard and the fox who is staring boldlyup the path, to the door. And still I believe you will come, Lord: you will, when I speak to the fox,the sparrow, the lost dog, the shivering sea-goose, know that really I am speaking to you whenever I say,as I do all morning and afternoon: Come in, Come in.

Mary Oliver, National Book Award- and Pulitzer Prize-winner, lives in Provincetown, Mass. Her works include American Primitive, the two-volume New and Selected Poems and At Blackwater Pond. This poem, published here for the fir

Comments

Twice now during the past week, a squirrel has eaten away parts of my windowsill and gnawed four-inch holes in the screen to facilitate its entry to my house.

Yes, I have read with appreciation Mary Oliver’s poem “Making the House Ready for the Lord” (9/25). “Come in, come in,” she says to animals seeking shelter as winter dawns on a snowy world.

And what is my response? Unlike the poet, I have for God’s creatures who live out there in my yard a lesser and imperfect love that stops upon my doorstep. Beyond that boundary I offer a crust of last night’s pizza, nuts and suet, apples, whole wheat bread crumbs. To these you are welcome. Help yourself, I say, but keep your distance. This house is mine. For the limits to my hospitality, may the Lord forgive me.

Twice now during the past week, a squirrel has eaten away parts of my windowsill and gnawed four-inch holes in the screen to facilitate its entry to my house.

Yes, I have read with appreciation Mary Oliver’s poem “Making the House Ready for the Lord” (9/25). “Come in, come in,” she says to animals seeking shelter as winter dawns on a snowy world.

And what is my response? Unlike the poet, I have for God’s creatures who live out there in my yard a lesser and imperfect love that stops upon my doorstep. Beyond that boundary I offer a crust of last night’s pizza, nuts and suet, apples, whole wheat bread crumbs. To these you are welcome. Help yourself, I say, but keep your distance. This house is mine. For the limits to my hospitality, may the Lord forgive me.